How the Blackhawks Became Unbeatable

They Rarely Hit and They Don't Give Up the Puck

Through their first 24 games of this truncated NHL season—a stretch during which they have not lost in regulation—the Chicago Blackhawks have shown they can win a game in just about any manner they want.

No team in the National Hockey League gives up fewer goals per game, and only three have scored more often. When hockey people talk about Chicago, their voices take on a quiet, tremulous tone—as if they're describing a voodoo hex.

But the black magic of the Blackhawks' streak lies not merely in what they've accomplished but in how they've accomplished it. Through the makeup of their roster and their style of play, they've thumbed their nose at the trendiest idea in the NHL: that a team's success is based primarily on its toughness—on its players' willingness to block shots and deliver bone-rattling body checks. By comparison, the Blackhawks might as well play their games in sequins with a panel of fur-clad judges looking on and Tchaikovsky blasting in the background.

Among the league's 30 teams, Chicago ranks 27th in hits and 24th in penalty minutes per game, and the average weight of a Blackhawks forward or defenseman is just 200.9 pounds. Only eight teams are lighter, and when it comes to building a winning roster, the inclination league-wide is that bigger is better. The Los Angeles Kings (210.4 pounds), last year's Stanley Cup champions, are the NHL's heaviest team, and the Anaheim Ducks (207.2), who this season have the second-best record in the Western Conference, are third.

As Bill Clement, who analyzes the league for Comcast SportsNet, put it, the Blackhawks "can't play the Incredible Hulk." What they can do, though, is use their collective speed and stickhandling ability to gain, regain and retain control of the puck, effectively turning a hockey game into a 60-minute round of Keep Away.

In the aftermath of its 2004-05 lockout, the league implemented a host of rules changes intended to open up the flow of play and cultivate more offense. But after a season-long spike in goal-scoring, teams figured out that if they dropped their skaters back on defense quickly, making the middle of the ice as crowded as a Times Square subway platform, they could keep opposing players on the perimeter of the rink. To penetrate that defensive shell, most teams sacrifice the puck, firing it into the zone in order to win it back amid the thicket of bodies near the net.

The Blackhawks have rejected that philosophy. Stan Bowman, their general manager, had enjoyed watching the Detroit Red Wings teams of the late 1990s and early 2000s that his father, Scotty, coached to three Stanley Cups. During that period, Scotty Bowman created "the Russian Five," a unit comprised entirely of Russian players who controlled the puck with such grace and synchronicity that the Blackhawks sought to emulate it themselves.

"It was an unusual style," said Stan Bowman, who at 39 is the youngest GM in the NHL. "It equates to the Harlem Globetrotters."

A dormant decade for the franchise—from 1998 to 2008, the Blackhawks made the playoffs once—allowed Bowman; his predecessor, Dale Tallon; and the team's player-personnel department to accumulate enough high draft picks to manifest their vision. The Blackhawks' four most talented and important players are all homegrown: forwards Patrick Kane (the No. 1-overall pick in 2007) and Jonathan Toews (No. 3 overall in 2006) and defensemen Duncan Keith (a second-round selection in 2002) and Brent Seabrook (No. 14 overall in 2003). Through a series of trades and signings, Tallon and Bowman then added other players who fit the team's approach, and in 2008, the organization hired a head coach who preferred a high-tempo style, Joel Quenneville. The changes helped the Blackhawks win the Stanley Cup in 2010—the franchise's first championship since 1961.

"They're totally unique," said Ray Ferraro, who analyzes the NHL for the Sports Network in Canada. "It's what you have available to play, the personnel you have. You can't turn singers into dancers."

Quenneville's system demands that his forwards chase down the puck-carrier to disrupt an opponent's offensive thrust, and the Blackhawks' superior stickhandling skills have helped them create 249 takeaways this season, by far the most in the NHL. Once the Blackhawks do force a turnover, their forwards slingshot themselves back up the ice to attack an opposing defense at full speed.

If the other team has recovered in time, the forwards won't dump the puck in; they'll double back and try to find another soft target. "Sometimes, it's all instinct," Kane said. "I've noticed I've had the most success when you can make a move and be by that first guy."

To maintain such a fast pace, Quenneville divvies out playing time more equitably than most coaches do. No Chicago player averages more than 24 minutes of ice time per game. "Later in games," Quenneville said, "we're fresher and doing the right things." And the team's success, according to Clement, affords Quenneville the confidence to stick with his role players even at a game's tensest moments.

In the latest example, the Blackhawks beat the Colorado Avalanche 3-2 on Wednesday night on Dan Carcillo's goal with 50 seconds left in regulation. A fourth-line left wing, Carcillo had not scored since Nov. 13, 2011—a span of 479 days.

"We have four lines that can play pretty much against any line, no matter when they're out there," Kane said. "It's cool."

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